My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
by LongSnakeMoan
Summary: "A man needs an interest, a way to pass the time. A man with no interests is no man at all." Tom Sloane had interests, well, one interest. It just happened to be slightly more specific than usual.


"A man needs an interest, a way to pass the time. A man with no interests is no man at all. The only thing I ask is that you be discreet. With the world as it is now, the chance for anyone to take a picture and spread it half way across the world in the blink of an eye, well you must be careful with whatever you decide to do. And only decide on one after you've lived a little. There is nothing more tedious than the man who decided what his little hobby would be as a teenager."

That had been the advice from his father as Tom had come of age, one of the few pearls of wisdom, apart from not pissing the family fortune away, which Angier had bestowed on his only son. And so, following the usual Bromwell experience of networking, discreet 'partying' as the rest of society would call it, and lining up potential wives from a roll call of his feminine contemporaries, Tom had set out on his Grand Tour. Oh, he knew it was an archaic relic of bygones times when the over privileged debauched their way across Europe, but that was when most men found their ideal interest. And it was on one such jaunt in a Turin backstreet that Tom found his.

"_She's beautiful."_

"She is," the proprietor said, watching as Tom ran his hand over the woman's smooth brown cheek and traced his fingers across her hair and down the small of her back. "The most beautiful of all my girls."

"You have more here? More of these women?"

"Oh yes. It may take some time but there's always more girls."

Tom looked down on the woman, her features calm and impassive. He'd known for a long while, as much as it would shame his father he'd known since he was a teenager at Bromwell exactly where his interest lay, in beautiful, passive women. It was strange; looking at his history with women, that of all the things he wanted that was the one. From the free spirited Jane, to the grimly determined Daria, to the ruthlessly ambitious Pandora, the social climbing Isabella and finally Octavia, his second cousin and most likely candidate to be his wife and all those between. These women could be described as many things. Witty, determined, independent, forward, intelligent and in Pandora's case, actually sadistic to some extent, they were all these things but they were not calm, docile. But that's what he wanted. Someone to be there for him and him alone. A woman for him and him alone. He'd tried the whole spectrum of femininity before he realised that was what he wanted. Not stupid, not stupid at all. Just calm, quiet, still, and his. Tom had always assumed that such a woman was a pipe dream, something that existed in the minds of only the most fevered of writers. But here she was, there, waiting for him. The proprietor tapped him on the shoulder, waking him from his reverie, pointing at the woman' beautiful face.

"Do you want her?"

Tom looked down on the serene features carved into the dark wood, patiently waiting for the objects to be placed on her back, woman as a table. He found something deeply beautiful in that. But he didn't want her, exquisite as she was. But he knew what he want, and he would pay whatever this man asked to get it.

"No," Tom grinned as the craftsman started at him in bemusement. "I don't want her."

"But, you said she was beautiful."

"She is, and she will one day make another man very happy. But from you I want something else."

His collaborator, the always wonderful Giovanni, had given him many women over the years, and they lay in a secret room, always locked and guarded by every security measure Tom could think of, hidden away from prying eyes. He knew that Octavia, his now wife as predicted by absolutely everyone, would not be impressed with his collection. She should have been, Tom reflected as he slowly moved towards his harem he supposed, these women were the reasons that he largely remained faithful to her. The first one he reached was an upright woman carved out of rosewood, her arms raised outwards, curved upwards at the end, long fingers stretched out to catch hold of hats and coats. Tom admired the sharp lines of her body, the way even her shadow seemed sharp against walls. She was an unusually artistic piece, uncommonly striking, face forever carved in devotion to him. He called her Jane.

He tended not to linger with Jane, poor girl, now as then those lines were entirely too sharp for his taste, and moved to his next piece. This one was a little more to his liking, much like the first woman he'd seen at Giovanni's, she was a light ash table, her arms and leg spread, as if in crab pose, her stomach the table top glinting the soft light. At the top of table her head hung backwards, tumbling hair gilted in gold. This was Pandora, so unlike her life self, her beautiful yet brutal features uncommonly softened, in his thrall for once. Tom rested a piece of paper on the table top and grinned at what the living woman would have thought of her representation, before chasing away the thought. Pandora was happily violent, in an upper class refined way of course, but still liable to a little pugilism now and them. He didn't want such thoughts here.

He'd tried to find a woman like these, perfectly passive and entirely permissive to his every whim, but it was impossible. He thought he'd found it a few times, chased it across the world, but every time the illusion proved greater than the reality, they were people after all, with wills of their own, and they either balked at the end result or wanted more than he was prepared to give. Paying them off was an expensive business, hush money made the threats go away but he remembered his father's other advice not piss his money away, and replicating those women in furniture, each with a different function in a different wood with a different expression of serenity, was the cheaper option. Anya, Lin, Regina, Zara, Camille, they were all here, all waiting for him.

The only other person who had seen this room was his father, only fair really considering he'd been party to some of Papa's interests. Only some though. There were some things that father and son did not need to know about each other. Angier had looked around, intrigued to the end; he had especially liked the look of Camille.

"_I assume she is based on someone you know."_

"You'd assume correctly."

"French, I would guess. Paris, maybe?"

"Lyon, actually. Close enough though. And am I correct to assume that you perhaps have some experience in this area yourself?"

"Well, not this precise area, but I have a number of French acquaintances. Fantine was my favourite, the sweetest smelling creature you could imagine. Brown curls, green eyes, entirely au naturel too. My Parisian nymph, not unlike this fine specimen we have here. Not unlike her at all."

"You approve, I take it?"

"Naturally."

Tom made his way to the end of his own exhibition, to the end of the road, or so he saw it. This was his favourite, his Fantine. A mahogany chair, a woman on all fours, entirely for him, waiting. She was beautiful, in his eyes more beautiful than the rest, though he knew that should he share his collection with the world she would finish last every time. Her hair hung long and loose, the slight wave still there and the wooden strands hit her shoulders. Her expression was of one of simple passivity, expectant of nothing but him, a slight smile playing on her lips. That was a rarity in itself, caught here forever. He had to look closely, so closely he could see every glimmer and his own distorted reflection as he stared, but around her eyes were the faintest traces of a pair of round framed spectacles. The little details made this chair, that one his favourite of all. Tom gently eased himself down onto the seat that was her wooden back, and smiled. She had mentioned once he treated her like an easy chair, accusing him of liking her because she was simple, no fuss. She couldn't have known how close to the truth she was. She was no Fantine though; no Parisian seductress was this one. This was one was his alone. He called her Daria. 


End file.
